Trained personnel are the limiting resource alongside money and tonnage. Each elderly battleship ties up roughly eight hundred crew who could serve in modern ships entering the fleet. The term "pre-dreadnought" is used as shorthand, but these are mostly Royal Sovereign-era vessels from the 1890s rather than immediate contemporaries of HMS Dreadnought. Moving them into harbor for disposal would free manpower and money while the fleet refits newer battleships and concentrates research on useful systems.
Chapter · 1:01:53-1:07:04
Refits, crew shortages, and retiring obsolete ships
Campaign planning weighs refitting battleships against scrapping 1890s pre-dreadnoughts to release crews and reduce operating costs.